Description

The impending threats of catastrophic climate change and peak oil are driving our society towards increased use of biomass for energy, chemical compounds and other materials - the beginnings of a biobased economy. As alternative development models for the biobased economy emerge, we need to determine potential applications, their perspectives and possible impacts as well as policies that can steer technological and market development in such a way that our objectives are met. Currently, it is still far from clear what will be the most sustainable routes to follow, which technologies should be included, and how their development will affect, and be affected by, research, public opinion and policy and market forces. This groundbreaking work, edited by a group of leading researchers originally from Wageningen Agricultural University in the Netherlands, sets out to unpick the complex systems in play. It provides an illuminating framework for how policy and market players could and should drive the development of a biobased economy that is effective, sustainable, fair and cost efficient.
Starting with a state-of-the-art overview of major biobased technologies, including biorefinery and technologies for the production of biofuels, biogas, biomass feedstocks for chemistry and bioplastics, it discusses how different actor groups interact through policy and markets. Information from case studies is used to demonstrate how the potential of the biobased economy in different parts of the world, such as North America, Europe, and emerging economies like China and Brazil can be realised using research, debate, policy and commercial development. The result is an essential resource for all those working in or concerned with biobased industries, their policy or research.

The Nancy Drew Starter Set is the perfect gift for aspiring detectives, or longtime fans of the series! The firstfive books are packaged together in a collectible box set with an updated design. Titles included are "#1 The Secret of the Old Clock," "#2 The Hidden Staircase," "#3 The Bungalow Mystery," "#4 The Mystery at Lilac Inn," and "#5 The Secret of Shadow Ranch.""
The shogun's sword tester and executioner--the o-tameshiyaku--is a position of great prestige requiring consummate skill. While the feared and respected Yamada "Decapitator" Asaemon holds the post, another swordmaster lives with the obsession of claiming the office, and this election can be won by only a single vote--cast in steel and certified in blood!
'Raban is, for my money, one of the key writers of the past three decades - not only for his immense stylistic showmanship, but also for the way he has taken that amorphous genre call 'travel writing' and utterly redefined its frontiers..."Passage to Juneau" is his finest achievement to date. Ostensibly an account of a voyage Raban took from his new home in Seattle to the Alaskan capital through that labyrinthine sea route called the Inside Passage, it is, in essence, a book about the nature of loss...You close this extraordinary book marvelling at this most distressing but commonplace of ironies. He's home, but he's lost. Just like the rest of us' - Douglas Kennedy, "Independent". 'This is an extraordinary book...The epic journey through eddies, rips, whirlpools and various other marine terrors quickly becomes intensely personal..."Passage to Juneau" is far more than a meditation on the sea and its meanings; it is also an unsparing self-examination, written with mordant humour and forensic ruthlessness' - Justin Cartwright, "Daily Telegraph". 'A thrilling adventure and a telling internal exploration...the writing contains natural description of breathtaking exactness...and the sea itself - in all its moods - has Building Construction Illustrated, Fifth Edition free epub surely never been so intricately painted' - Edward Marriott, "Evening Standard".